title: Confounding psychosis in the postpartum period.
abstract: This case report alerts the psychiatric clinician to consider nonpsychiatric etiologies of psychosis appearing during the postpartum period besides postpartum psychosis. The case includes a description of the patient's psychiatric presentation, admission to the inpatient psychiatric unit with subsequent transfer to the medicine department including neuroimaging and neurological consultation. The patient had a remission of psychosis after only two and half days of antipsychotic medication administration. Positive findings on the MRI suggested a demyelinating disease and a 4-month follow up MRI continued to be positive. The etiology was presumed to be a demyelinating disease. In conclusion, psychiatrists need to be alert to include nonpsychiatric pathologies in the differential diagnosis when a patient presents with psychosis in the postpartum period.
authors.affiliation: Metropolitan Hospital Center, New York, NY, USA, Jack_castro@hotmail.com.
authors.forename: Jack
authors.initials: J
authors.lastname: Castro
authors.forename: Stephen
authors.initials: S
authors.lastname: Billick
authors.forename: Anne
authors.initials: A
authors.lastname: Kleiman
authors.forename: Maria
authors.initials: M
authors.lastname: Chiechi
authors.forename: Mohamed
authors.initials: M
authors.lastname: Al-Rashdan
mesh_terms: D000328:Adult; D003711:Demyelinating Diseases / Q000175:diagnosis* / Q000000981:diagnostic imaging; D003937:Diagnosis, Differential; D003951:Diagnostic Errors; D005260:Female; D005500:Follow-Up Studies; D006801:Humans; D008279:Magnetic Resonance Imaging; D049590:Postpartum Period; D011618:Psychotic Disorders / Q000175:diagnosis* / Q000000981:diagnostic imaging / Q000209:etiology; D011859:Radiography